I don't disagree that bronze is probably the best Plushy could do at Sochi, but does he agree? I don't think he will come back at all if he doesn't think he can win the gold medal He already has the gold, more medals are meaningless for him unless he wins another gold. I personally think Plushy will retire after Europeans--but we shall see.

Well you could be right, and I have often said I wouldnt be surprised if his comeback is just limited to domestic (Russian) and European competitions only. Which is perfectly fine, he obviously is still competitive there. It is all his choice obviously. All that said I cant imagine he is so delusional to think if he does show up at the Sochi Olympics it is the same situation as Vancouver even, let alone Turin, and that if he somehow snuck onto the podium and won a bronze medal he would throw another hissy fit similar to Vancouver. If he does show up it probably does mean he has some belief, but I am sure he would also know he definitely isnt the favorite this time.

I dont think Plush had a clean skate at Nationals, an iffy quad, no 3-3 combo,UR or downgraded -I m not sure- on 3z-2t, low levels on spins, and his score was even less than Euros, with inflated pcs yes. And I dont remember Dai, Hanyu and Fernandez falling all over the place in GPF, Daisuke fell on the first quad, who else? Nationals aside, it was supposed to be of their best performances. Chan's score was lower anyway.

His euros 2010 performance would probably not have medaled in Vancouver because of the doubled jump and big free skate problems he had in euros 2010 which was similar to his Russian nationals free skate this year. Like the << plushenko got at this years Russian nationals was part of a free skate that would not be competitive for good against a gpf Fernandez in the fs. So he has to improve for eruos 2012 like his improvement on jumps from 2010 euros to 2010 Olympics which was plushenkos best performance with jumps because there was no doubling of any triples or tripling of any quads.

Plushenko main goal is gold medal in Sochi. If he skates clean, he will be out of reach, with all inprovment to his skating in last couple of years he can even have a few mistakes and still win gold. As of today, I don't see any areas where he has real weakness.

Wasnt a 30 year old skater that nobody had heard of before the bronze medalist, lol! Gachinski did win that bronze at Worlds one year, but that is looking increasingly to be a Meissners World title level fluke of the decade type moment, likely based on some home cooking as well. Too bad we cant somehow transmit one of Abbotts good competiions to Worlds that year and have him win the silver or bronze instead.